


Nine Rules for Living in a Broken World

by wisdomeagle



Category: Angel: the Series, Baby-Sitters Club - Ann M. Martin, Dark Angel, Firefly, Stargate Atlantis, Stargate SG-1, Veronica Mars (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Crossover, Dancing, Drabbles, International Blog Against Racism Week, Multi, Post-Apocalypse, Sparring, Survival
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-08-24
Updated: 2006-08-24
Packaged: 2018-02-17 00:54:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2291009
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wisdomeagle/pseuds/wisdomeagle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Re: the odd collection of fandom tags: this is a set of nine thematically interconnected drabbles all set in the <cite>Dark Angel</cite> universe, featuring a variety of characters and pairings from multiple fandoms. </p>
<p>How we endure, survive, thrive, spar, fight, and emulate squirrels.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nine Rules for Living in a Broken World

**Author's Note:**

> These nine drabbles are responses to International Blog Against Racism Week prompts. They are all set in the Dark Angel universe, but can be read with no knowledge of that world beyond this: In the future America is a third-world nation, and almost everyone is terribly poor. Each drabble can be read individually.

**I. Dance alone.**  
[ _Dark Angel_. Original Cindy. For webbgirl]

Over the thudding bass line and under the flickering lights about to blow -- what, third blackout this week? -- every word has to be shouted or misunderstood. But that's okay. If she wanted to talk, Original Cindy would be elsewhere, anywhere else. Privacy's not exactly easy to find in a city as big as Seattle, but surely she could do better than a room twelve feet square, every inch of her personal space filled with other people's flesh and stolen leather jackets. "Hey," someone shouts from her left. "Wanna dance?"

Original Cindy shoves hard away from him. "Already am."

 

**II. Dance with your head held high.**  
[ _Dark Angel_ x _Angel_. Original Cindy and Gunn. For malnpudl]

There are few nights in her life when Original Cindy feels more shame than pride. Break-ups, broken appliances, petty shoplifting, blowing off work, whatever, Original Cindy rises above minor disasters with her head held high.

At the shelter, she meets kids -- _kids_ , children younger than she can remember being -- who have never slept without shame. She meets people who are _shameless_ , who think that begging is not beneath them. If nothing else, every kid who walks through their door is admitting "I need help."

"They've had it rough"," says Gunn, hefting his end of the couch.

"No shit."

 

**III. Dance together.**  
[ _Angel_. Gunn, Wesley, and Fred. For callmesandy]

Butcher (that's Wes, with thirteen different tools for skewering demons) baker (Fred, who's taken over the kitchen brewing potions), candlestick maker (he's sick of whittling stakes, but a guy can only examine another guy's sword collection or pretend interest in the chemistry of demon goop so many times): by day they are three, and they're starting to get on each other's nerves.

But when night comes, they are one, and when he can _feel_ adrenaline flowing, when his stakes are tipped with the poison Fred concocted and Wes has his back, the second before the slaying, then Gunn is invincible.

 

**IV. Dance in the snow.**  
[ _Stargate: Atlantis_. Ford. S1 continuity. For sweetcommunist]

Ford went home to (the Major's words) get away from it all. Except everything Atlantis has, Earth has too, in spades (and clubs, and hearts. Not diamonds, not in piss-poor third world America.) War, oppression, uselessly advanced technology 

And, like certain unpleasant planets in the Pegasus 'gate system, Earth has snow.

Snow's the same: still white, even if shot through with pollution, still cold enough to freeze a body dead, the same snow he built forts out of four decades ago. The snow's the same, but everything else has changed, especially him, and Ford wishes he'd never come back here.

 

**V. Dance like fighting.**  
[ _Stargate: Atlantis_ x _Buffy: the Vampire Slayer_. Teyla/Faith. For thelastgoodname]

For the tenth time, Faith lunges at Teyla, and for the tenth time, Teyla blocks her easily. At least this time Faith manages not to land on her butt. 

"You must. Be. Patient," Teyla says through gritted teeth, and resumes her position. Faith doesn't bother to bow or have honor -- since when are slayers supposed to be honorable, anyhow? -- but slides under Teyla's outstretched arm and gets in a low kick that hits Teyla's shin guard squarely. "Better."

"Know what would be even better?"

"We are not having sex," Teyla says, "until you can defeat me in combat."

 

**VI. Dance; don't cry.**  
[ _Stargate: SG-1_. Sam and Teal'c. For ctorres]

 

Patrolling alone in an abandoned mining town (haunted, the gas station attendant told them) feels almost like old times. If she concentrates, Sam can hear Colonel O'Neill's tread three yards behind her, can see Daniel slipping ahead of them to check out a dried-up well. Ghost town, indeed.

Teal'c's gone suddenly still, and Sam reaches automatically for her automatic, sure that he's spotted a Goa'uld or at least a footprint. But when he turns, he's smiling, and he points to a rotten tree where a family of squirrels are eating nuts. 

"Even here," he says, "they are building a life."

 

**VII. Dance through your tears.**  
[ _Firefly_ x _Stargate: SG-1_. Zoe. For rydra_wong]

One wormhole destroyed _Serenity_ and another Mal's soul, and every wormhole since then has tumbled a diminishing crew into a worse world. Hope's vision narrows, from husband, ranch, two kids, to husband, to crew, and then there's no one left but her own self and a lifetime of lost causes. 

Folk fighting for their lives she respects, but fighting beyond life to free a nation of slaves feels suspiciously like a road that Zoe already knows ends in a cul-de-sac.

But she has a gun, and the Jaffa know where to shoot, and in these worlds, that's something.

**VIII. Dance with the enemy.**  
[ _Veronica Mars_. Weevil/Logan. For amerella and mosca]

If they were better people -- but don't. Weevil and Logan aren't better people. They'd rather fight each other, bloody noses and swollen eyes, then fight anything that starts with race or ends with -ism. Screw that; brawling with Logan on the beach used to _be_ fighting racism, but now the enemy has a larger face and broader focus. Logan's strictly entertainment.

They encounter each other less than they used to; Weevil's people didn't survive the flash, the crash, and Logan's, albeit a little poorer, did. But a boy's gotta have fun, and they see each other enough for that.

 

**IX. Dance.**  
[Baby-Sitters Club. Jessi. For sangerin]

Waitressing destroyed her feet and her concentration, and when the restaurant closed (who has money for black-tie Thai these days?), three simultaneous telemarketing jobs almost destroyed her soul. But even with fallen arches, Jessi can dance, and she does, every day, waking up at four AM to stretch, reminding herself despite her aching back of first position, second position,... she takes a deep breath, lifts her arms. Her fingers fall naturally into position, and for a moment, she is no one, not Jessi Ramsey, baby-sitter, not Jessi Ramsey, telemarketer, not Jessi at all, not even a dancer, but just _dance_.


End file.
